Helping Jarrod Washburn Find Work

He's 35-years-old, and he posted a 7.33 ERA with a .940 OPS against in eight starts following his trade to Detroit. His season ended in mid-September with a knee injury that required surgery.

He's extremely homer prone, giving up one long ball for every 7.2 innings pitched or so over the last four seasons. While his walk rate was solid at 2.51 BB/9 last year, he doesn't miss many bats (5.1 K/9) and will give up more than his fair share of hits.

Lighten up his salary demands, and accept an offer from a team regardless of their proximity to his home. There are plenty of unsettled rotation spots out there, so there should be interest in a guy who hasn't made fewer than 25 starts in a season since 2000.

Embrace a move to the bullpen. Being lefthanded is already a good start, but being able to shutdown lefties (.178/.224/.311 against last year) adds some validity to the idea.

On the day he was traded, Washburn had the second lowest ERA (2.64) in the American League and was on his way to helping a contender make a playoff run. Instead, he finished the season on the surgeon's table, and teams would rather roll the dice with questionable in-house options than meet Washburn's asking price.

Comments

I think Jarrod Washburn can sign with many teams right now. So many are looking for pitching depth. Dodgers, Mets, Royals, Mariners, and so on. I don’t think he’s desperate enough to find a home right now. For someone of his, usual durability, and sometimes success, he could find a job at any time during the season.

If he were desperate for a job, which i don’t think he is. Reports are he can sign with Seattle now but they aren’t agreed on a money value yet, he would go for a bullpen job. But he’s the best SP in the market today, moving to the pen is worthless, and will decrease his money value this season and in the future.

First he should fire Scott Boras his agent as he hasn’t been able to find a contract for him. Then Washburn can become his own agent and keep all the money for himself. He can wait till midseason when teams become more desparate and willing to pay more. Like Pedro Martinez did last year.

Reports are Washburn will take one month to get ready as it is. I’m not sure it’s all too much Boras’ fault on this. If he cared enough to get a job quickly, he would have kept himself in shape throughout spring training.

I personally can’t believe they even made the offer. I’m certain they’re glad he didn’t take it. He would have filled the 5th rotation spot that Liriano now has a firm grasp on. He has much better upside than Washburn, and if he flakes, there’s still Duensing, who is also a lefty.

He could be a really useful piece. I like the idea of pitching him out of the bullpen in long relief. When the inevitable injury comes along, Washburn is a nice guy to step in and pick up the slack. There are tons of teams out there right now with #4/#5 starters that aren’t as good as Washburn.

Washburn isn’t about the money? Neither is Dye or LaRoche…. except that they all ended up in the same situation because they are about the money. Washburn turned down and offer from the Twins, a contender fairly close to Wisconsin, opening a new stadium, the offer was probably 5x higher than anyone else is going to offer him. That’s called being about the money.

My guess is that the Twins are lucky he didn’t accept. If they couldn’t have found someone to approximate Washburn’s performance for a fraction of the $5 million they offered him then they aren’t trying hard enough. Washburn simply isn’t very good.